


The ward

by hauntedpoem



Category: TOLKIEN J. R. R. - Works & Related Fandoms, The Silmarillion and other histories of Middle-Earth - J. R. R. Tolkien
Genre: 7th age, Elrond's headache, Erestor's compendium of raising elflings, Gen, Glorfindel makes the 8th foster parent that maeglin has had, Glorfindel truly believes in 'spare the rod and spoil the child', Good Intentions Bad Results, Orphans, Reborn Elves, Secret Identities, Valinor, Wards, child rearing, elflings have the same culinary appetite as hobbits, elvish equivalent of a foster home, hurt comfort, lots of domestic stuff, mentions of the traitor of Gondolin and history backlash, post LOTR, woes of being a foster parent
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-05-07
Updated: 2017-05-30
Packaged: 2018-10-29 05:37:21
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 4,333
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10847547
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hauntedpoem/pseuds/hauntedpoem
Summary: Glorfindel's new charge is someone from his past.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [katnor](https://archiveofourown.org/users/katnor/gifts).



Seventh Age, Valinor.  There were souls so diminished from their stay in the Halls of Mandos that they returned as children in the most unexpected of places. Lady Anaire found Sindar twins in her garden. They lived there for weeks, apparently, surviving on cabbage and squash.

Now, they took turns educating them and helping these elves reach maturity. Each adult had the obligation to care for and teach one of these children until their memories came back. Glorfindel still had trouble returning to his old self after his last protégé, Marilla, turned fifty and decided to look for her family among the people of the Teleri. He had a cupboard full of her clothes since she was a ten year old and declared an orphan in need. The children whose parents could not be found, were supposed to enter a master's house or that of a family and learn about life, lore, history, housework and whatever was deemed necessary. Some were reincarnated warriors, others were poets and scribes or farmers. Many children changed protectors and tutors over the course of time. Marilla has had only him and it made Glorfindel think that perhaps she did not get to live for too long in her former life. From what she told him, she didn't die a violent a death, which he was thankful for but she was born in the midst of a war when dragons attacked their encampment and survived on very little on the run.

There had been many books and studies written on the subject of the Returned. A large portion of them came back in the Fourth Age, already grown up and with memories intact. The more time passed, the younger they got when they stepped foot in Valinor again. He wondered briefly when the sons of Feanor, his cousins, would return. They might never come back or... they might return as wailing babes. He had few charges since he himself sailed to Valinor, back in the beginning of the Fourth Age. Most of them were teenagers who didn't fit in the cramped schools of Tirion. One was a minstrel from Thranduil's court and stayed with him briefly, the other was the daughter of a Noldor lord and she recovered most of her memories by the end of her tenth year as an apprentice in his house, then left. 

Glorfindel deemed himself as being quite unfit for this parental role but he accepted his duty as an adult with too much free time on his hands, seeing how swamped they were in Tirion where they registered all the returned orphans and assigned families to them. In the beginning, they were cared for by families but soon, when no less than a hundred returned made an appearance in the main square one morning, they decided to assign them to willing single parties as well. Elrond and his wife, Celebrian, took three in their care. Erestor already had a hoard of ten children which he appointed as his apprentices in the library and even Finwe's second wife, Indis, hosted a dozen of girls to teach them the ways of the Valar and proper etiquette.

He already knew how Erestor treated his charges. Less parental, more like a scholar. In luck was Haldir of Lorien who returned sometimes during the Fifth Age on the doorstep of Galadriel who was then busy with her political campaign. Or some of the Feanorions' followers who landed in Nerdanel's workshop as boisterous children. 

Sometimes, Noldor would come from Thranduil's woods and wood elves and green-elves would emerge from Erestor's library. Now, with them as children, it was difficult to push them into learning a craft or an art and Glorfindel's house was one of the most lenient and criticised at the same time. Instead of giving them chores like sweeping his halls and mending his old clothes, he would teach them about integrity, critical thinking and survival. Or dance and gardening and birdwatching as he did with Marilla. He taught them how to read and write, of course, Quenya and Sindarin, he read to them from myths and legends, he took them to meet Este in her gardens, he took them to the theatre but he never pushed his own beliefs onto them in the scope of creating a guild of minions like Erestor has done with his charges.

He has been called to the council room and bowed to the lady Alassinde who took the whole project very seriously. As many Vanyar were pious and very knowledgeable of the languages and dialects of elves, Glorfindel had to admit that they have been overwhelmed lately by the new wave of returned who spoke incomprehensible dialects of Sindarin. He returned home with his new charge, a flaxen-haired girl of five who could not be dissuaded to stop sucking her thumb or chew on her own hair. He decided to call her Haldalote until she would pick up some of the spoken Quenya but in three day's time, the lady Alessinde returned on his doorstep with a request, took Haldalote away for she had found her parents among the green-elves and left him with a cloak covered small figure saying that she was not good with caring for boys and left. Oh, and this one knew a bit of Quenya which was surprising, seeing how Avarin he looked.

It took Glorfindel all his patience to make his new charge drop the cloak and show his face. After promises of sweet fruit and honeyed cakes, as well as a dreaded session of crying, the child showed himself. Glorfindel was left mouth agape. In front of him stood none other than Maeglin Lomion, son of Eol the dark elf and Aredhel, the White Lady of Gondolin. His eyes gleamed with tears and his hair was a soft, silky mess as dark as the night. The child looked doleful at him, understanding that they didn't find his mother yet.

 

 

 


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thanks to katnor, I have decided to post another chapter of this. I write strange things lately and I am glad when someone shows interest!  
> ^_^  
> I write at my own pace so this will take a while. It has been in my head for too long to be ignored, all I have to do is remember and start writing.

It wasn't exactly honey and other mundane promises of sweet nothings that drew the child in. It was the kindness. The child stopped his crying, a heart-wrenching ululation that sent shivers down his spine and made him tighten his hands into fists. A child's cry so sad that it spoke of terrible loneliness and fear of abandonment.

"There, you are in your new home, now, there..." He tried to soothe his new charge.

He stopped for a while, probably curious about what Glorfindel, the mysterious stranger would say next. Still wrapped tightly in the black robe, visage obscured by its cape, the boy resumed expressing his misfortune and distress by sniffles and sparse hiccups. It dawned on Glorfindel that he tried not to cry in front of the stranger that was to be his new foster home.

What a stupid thing to say, Glorfindel chided himself for not having the presence of mind to realise that the boy's distress was a direct response to the way Lady Alessinde just left him with a strange man, like one would leave a sack of potatoes in the basement. In the end, he did as Glorfindel asked. He stopped crying and muffled his sounds, no doubt, by biting his own hands. Glorfindel could see those wiry appendages twisting and suppressing and knew this had to stop. He took his time waiting for his foster child to unravel by opening the letter that Alessinde left with him. 

Elves were not cruel, that he knew, but sometimes, they were so well-intentioned that they could miss other perspectives or completely forget to take into account some essential things, such as the feelings of this child who, in a matter of months changed no less than seven homes. Surely, that made him feel deeply inadequate and bad, it made him cry, it made him distressed beyond measure, terrified him. They found him deep inside a cave, after some signs that Irmo the Vala gave them through dreams. He had been there for quite some time, naked and afraid of them, like a cornered beast. He preferred the dark, it seemed, and spoke a butchered language that they heard only some clans speak.

His first home was a family of farmers who wanted the child for they thought he had some special talent with the animals. It proved he was more than they could take and he entered his second, a Telerin merchant's mansion but the boy had a difficult character and the lord passed him on to another merchant's house, and then to another family, this time of healers who wanted to treat his love of dark and cool places by exposing him to the sun every single day. The child met some unforeseen trouble and created havoc in their home and he had to go again, to a shepherd's wife who desperately wanted a boy to teach him sensible things like singing and dancing, but the boy had an appetite for disaster and got himself in a bit of a quarrel which left him with chopped hair and a split lip. Again, he was being passed to the Vanyar, the most pious of folk in these places and he entered the service of a bookmaker who had rather strange ideas about child rearing and so, he reached Alessinde's house where all he did was cry and bawl incessantly until it drove her mad and she decided that Glorfindel would be the best choice of a foster parent.

Instead of feeling confident, Glorfindel began feeling overwhelmed. Just then, his new charge quieted down considerably, tired perhaps, and began humming a strange ditty. The words were in a long forgotten Avarin dialect he's heard with only an occasion. Maeglin Lomion's forge. 

Later, as he helped the child- Lomion himself, up the stairs, Glorfindel had the most wondrous thought. He could not believe how his day turned. Maeglin Lomion, he kept saying his name quitely. 

"Lomion," he called the child, whose eyes opened up like black pools in the dim room that Glorfindel set for him. "You'll be staying here with me. I won't give you away, I promise." He said it with all the conviction he was capable of and Lomion understood his meaning very well, for he was tranquil and malleable. 

His ribs showed harshly through the pale skin, he suffered sunburns on his back and shoulders- perhaps due to the excess light therapy he's been obliged to, his long, silky hair had been chopped in uneven layers and his ankles and wrists suffered the horrible treatment of the chafing, the result of wearing inappropriately heavy embroidered tunics and leggings. He knew Lomion's ears and eyes and skin to be sensitive beyond measure, he'd known it since Gondolin, a result of being a delicate halfbreed, misunderstood and judged by many. Glorfindel was too distracted by his memories of the past to even remember the way history treated Maeglin. This terrified child, still adapting to his new environment was none other than the worst elf in history, besides Feanor and his murderous sons, perhaps. 


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> To be honest, I am not entirely pleased with how this chapter came out. I was seriously thinking of editing the other chapters as well. I might do that because it will improve the flow of the story. These being said, enjoy!

First, it’s a hot water bath that he draws, then he’s  seriously thinking of hiring a helper, because in a matter of hours, Glorfindel feels too exhausted to leave the chair he’s plopped into.

Maeglin. No, Lomion, for he needs to protect that identity from everyone except those that could help him, is not a bad tempered child but he’s mistrustful and speaks very little. Glorfindel is doing all the talking, trying as hard as possible not to butcher too much the Avarin he barely remembers.

Even his kitchen resources are not at their best. Glofindel used to fast for days, mostly because in this age of dull peace, few need the abilities of a warrior of the olden times and no one is waging war on anyone. The best he can do is try to look presentable for the monthly feast in Elrond’s homely house, to appear well-informed for Erestor’s invitations at the conferences he holds weekly in the heart of Tirion and to seem like he has everything together for when Lady Alessinde or one of the ladies from her entourage come and visit. He sometimes visits his father, about once every year, mostly because otherwise he would forget he had one to start with. The man, a Vanya of Ingwe’s line, is a devout attendant to Manwe’s works. And every six months he braces himself for the presence of his mother who never fails to ask him about marriage and moving on and finding “at least a humble Avarin girl” and perpetuate Ingwe’s line. Glorfindel has tired of telling her he doesn’t sway that way, that he is not interested in maidens and he will never be.

At night, after a tedious day of clearing a suite for Maeglin – Lomion- he corrects himself, he thinks how ironic this is. It hurts and he needs a friend to talk to. Calling Alessinde and telling her the truth will only put a strain on Maeglin- Lomion!, he yells in his head- the child he’s supposed to educate and protect and feed and show the ways of their people. Oh dear, he waited millennia for him to return. He pined for him ever since Gondolin, he even loved him in the light of the terrible news of betrayal. Nothing could smash that love out of him. It shames him now. The love of his life returned in the form of his ward. It downright frightens him, he never asked for it.

Erestor, the old, wise fox, he knew. Elrond, the wisest elf he ever met, had understood that much but he was just too gracious to even mention it. He needed his council now, more than ever.

Mornings were a very interesting affair. Lomion would wake at dawn and wander the house as silent as a cat, or an elf. He would oftentimes find himself waking up to the black gaze of the child fixed upon him. It seemed both curious and somehow accusing, and he complained several times that Glorfindel wastes the day. Oh, how the child loved light! And how it rejected him for his face, his neck and pale hands looked scorched after a day’s play in the garden, while Glorfindel was trying to plant potatoes and tomato seedlings to create more sources of food for his charge.

They already had apple trees and cherry trees, a plot full of salads that Glorfindel forgot to water for a week, ever since Lomion made his appearance and turned his world upside down. He did not want to be unprepared anymore. He didn’t want to be deemed unfit by the time Alessinde’s next council meeting came up.

For all that he knew, he looked haggard, his charge leaping from stone to stone and hiding among the willow branches like a wild sprite, dressed in Marilla’s old clothes, barefoot and with a knot of tangled hair, because Glorfindel could simply not cut it for he started crying every time he saw it.

It wasn’t also, a matter of manners. Lomion learned fast. He always said ‘Good morning’ and ‘Good Night’, ‘Thank you and good day’. The most of his socialisation happened when the milkman brought two bottles every morning or when their envoy came bearing from the market a cart of vegetables. Dark leafy greens, tomatoes, peas, beetroots, cabbages, flour, oil and citrus fruits that grew aplenty on the steep Vanyarin orchards.

Everything here was in the open, pale stone, high cliffs, dry, calcareous soils and windy. Everywhere were shrines dedicated to the Valar and little geometrical gardens kept in perfect order. Everyone was dressed in light coloured garb for here the sun had more intensity and almost everyone halted everything they were doing to address prayers to the Valar, in the morning, at lunch and in the evening. They were… the pious, the kind and the neutral in all matters over which the Noldor and the Teleri, especially the Sindar had shown an interest. They were fair but they were nothing like the Sindar who were very fiery in comparison. Glorfindel was the wild card, it seemed, being the product of the joining between a Noldo and  Vanya and following Fingolfin over Helcaraxe.

Among sheepherders, weavers, artists and philosophers, he was the only one who had the reputation of a warrior, disciplined and versed in taking and protecting lives. Sometimes children would ask him how it was to die in flames, battling a balrog and he would have to repeat the whole dull affair over and over again. Sometimes, people would bring him wreaths of flowers and ask him to participate in dull ceremonies dedicated to Orome or to oversee the Rites of Tulkas where boys and girls would prove themselves athletically every year.

This whole thing made him feel ancient and it wasn’t a good thing now when he had Lomion as his charge. Glorfindel rose up from his chair and strengthened his back. He had to cook for the late meal, see a tailor about Lomion’s clothes, take a trip to Tirion for supplies. It couldn’t be more difficult than polishing mail and armour every other day and cleaning blades off orc’s blood. He still had to attend his weekly sparring session with old friends from Gondolin and prepare for one of Erestor lectures on history. 

The flavour of the chicken soup wafted from the kitchen and in a matter of minutes, as wild as ever, Lomion slunk in the chair at the table, patiently waiting to be served. He already snuck a slice of bread and began eating it demurely and as silent as ever. Glorfindel was adding the last touches to their late meal. After a last vigorous stir and a tablespoon of minced parsley, it was ready to be served. He almost lost his footing seeing Lomion at the table, dark as a racoon, pretending not to have his mouth stuffed with bread. Defying eyes. He smiled, despite feeling scrutinised, uncomfortable under that gaze. Two ceramic bowls were placed on the table and the minute he offered a spoon, Lomion dropped the other three slices directly into the bowl and with a scowl, began to eat.  

He could get used to this, he thought. He smiled benevolently and extracted some pork loins from the meat cupboard to roast while Lomion delighted in the soggy bread. Apparently, children that age eat a lot. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> He's not exactly an angel, this Lomion... just a very unsettling presence but Glorfindel is willing to do anything to make this transition as bearable as possible.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> again, nothing special, just domestic, quiet stuff, if that's your thing :))

Why is it that the eating habits of small elven children remind Glorfindel of the hobbits that once visited Imladris on their way to Mordor, ages ago? He remembers Bilbo, and his nephew, Frodo, very well. He spent quite a long time conversing with the old hobbit about songs and lore and even swordfighting. He knows what it is. Both hobbits and elven children seem to eat their weight in food. Actually, he cannot comprehend how in the name of Mandos did the previous foster parents of Lomion reach the preposterous conclusion that the child was picky.

Picky and fussy, he was not. True, even Glorfindel wasn’t that optimistic in the beginning but things changed drastically. His ward could finish a pot of stew and still ask for seconds. He tried to ignore the breadcrumbs he always seemed to find in Lomions bed when he came to air the sheets in the morning. Crumbs, stones, leaves, twigs, and a quarter of dried bread. He was amazed he didn’t find any small animal, yet, like a lizard or a mouse. Ever since that discovery, he always fed him five times a day, with seconds and desert. It wasn’t spoiling the child. Glorfindel opposed any rule that Erestor, in his teaching crisis during the years of the twins’ growth might have instilled.

Lomion was the perfect child. He had boundless energy and was learning fast. He wasn’t too interested in learning how to write or read but he was an avid listener and his mind absorbed every tiny detail that Glorfindel could spare. This meant that Quenya was taken very seriously, as well as the main Sindarin dialect and through some colossal efforts and some commissioned tomes from the printmaker’s, he managed to find some clues on the Avarin dialects. But reading words from a dictionary to a child proved to be very tedious, so Glorfindel  began recounting the history as he knew it in his two lives. They reached the Balrog slaying episode and Lomion seemed completely unimpressed. Instead, he was thrilled to hear about the forest. He found legends and myths, stories about the magical Nan Elmoth and the Old Forest, songs and lore about Fangorn and Mirkwood. He told him tales of an Elvenking that rode upon his stag to war. He told him about the alliances of men and elves in their fight against the eternal darkness, he told him about the stealing of the Silmarils.

In a matter of months, Glorfindel managed to be able to make do without an aide. Lomion helped around the house the way he could, sweeping the floors and wiping dust. The cleaning of plates and the cooking was left to Glorfindel who felt on the brink of exasperation every time the child dropped a piece of ceramic just to see whether it won’t break. That didn’t happen and Lomion reached his conclusion, albeit a sullen one.

“Why don’t they make them out of metal?”

And Glorfindel had to confide that he had no idea but that ceramic and porcelain were very fine pieces indeed. Metal was cold and made clanking noises and wood was too rustic.

He refused several invitations to dinner from Elrond but wrote to him regularly. The thought that he was beginning to hide in his secluded villa on the cliffs of Taniquetil with his charge, away from the bustling civilisation of Tirion.

Everything grew better and faster in the blessed realm. The earth was always fertile and the animals aplenty. Trees were bearing fruit all year long in some regions, except Formenos and the edges of Helcaraxe, and it sufficed to plant a seed in his garden to watch the plant reach maturity in less than a week. Even children seemed to grow faster here. Lomion’s hair grew longer and Glorfindel finally took the scissors in hand and made equal cuts.

“What about my mother?” He asks and Glorfindel cannot escape the focus of those dark eyes. He knows it’s necessary, to tell the truth but Glorfindel has no idea how to breach the subject. Either way, it is going to be painful for both of them. He’s postponed it so far.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am well aware that my work gets little traffic due to the fact that I have made it available only to registered users. that's my fault and I have my reasons.  
> I hope you enjoyed this little piece!  
> ^_^


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I am trying to steer this fic towards a little bit of action and dialogue and more Lomion time :) this is just the beginning.

They would gather the returned in the central halls of Tirion’s council building every turn of the moon. Notes pertaining to their descriptions and portraits would be published just outside its walls in the hope that the parents still waiting for their babies to return would come and identify them. Three out of five cases were successful. Alessinde represented the Vanyar and she managed those found in her area. The rest of them, wouldn’t be deemed ‘orphans’ but they would be assigned to families and single parties to manage their care.

Erestor and some elves that delved deep into psychology and child rearing wrote entire studies on the matter. Children, they were, but in a previous life, some have reached adulthood and the more they stayed in Mandos’ Halls, the less adapted to return they were. They made a fuss when Fingolfin returned and an even bigger one when Feanor came back. He came back as a grown man and after a brief visit to Finwe’s palace, he sought out Nerdanel and went to stay in her father’s house.  Glorfindel found out that Eol lived as an adolescent in his parents’ home. You cannot pass a child to another child, especially when they have no recollection of their past. However, if Aredhel appeared, they would all know.

But she didn’t, to Glorfindel’s surprise.

“She was known here as the White Lady…” he continued his storytelling and looked at Lomion intently. His visage has become a closed book. Glorfindel could only guess.

“And what about my father? And my grandparents?”

It was the first time when Glorfindel had nothing to say. He already felt bad for keeping his ward’s identity as a secret. He reached the point where he thought he was making a big mistake. The child was sociable enough but because of Glorfindel’s habits, they spend their time mostly at home, in the study or in the garden. He could tell that Lomion was growing restless, slowly remembering things from his early childhood, faces he didn’t have a name for yet. Visions of the wild and ancient forest of nan Elmoth were plaguing his dreams. Faces smiling or frowning and the feeling of having lost something important. Puzzle pieces that made no sense. And Glorfindel felt more and more inadequate. He thought the market or the public school would be a good place for Lomion but the teachers complained that he was undisciplined and lacked follow through and insisted on teaching him at home. His Quenya was fluent enough but Lomion lacked an interest in books or a will to perfect it beyond common speech. He preferred to be read to or told stories, he preferred walking through the woods and swimming in the lake. He liked the sun but had to stay in the shadow. Glorfindel was at an impasse.

Letters were piling on his desk and he isolated himself from his weekly visits. Alessinde came on her rounds every month or so but she took in two more children and was swamped with work and social gatherings.  Elrond wrote to him as usual but now three of his letters were left unopened. Lindir sent him a preview of his new composition and he wrote a hasty reply.  Erestor  was more insistent, almost borderline bothersome, always well-informed and always promising a surprise visit. Glorfindel dreaded that. But why? He'd done nothing wrong, except he was hiding Maeglin Lomion away from the world. 

 


End file.
